Control the Nightmares
by imonlyhuman-odair
Summary: Katniss is brought to the old Dauntless Headquarters by strangers, in hope that she will be able to conquer her fears, and give them something in return.


"Ms. Everdeen."

I stare at the pitch black walls of what seems to be a giant pit. Where now stands computers and laboratories obviously once contained everyday human life. A shiver runs up my back as I am reminded of district 13. My heart rate speeds up and slows down, speeds up and slows down, up and down, down and up.

"Ms. Everdeen?" I jolt out of my anxious daze.

"Yes. That's me." I say quietly.

"We are ready for you now, please follow me." The owner of these words is a woman, probably in her early twenties, she has straight blonde hair and sharp facial features. Except for her eyes, her eyes are kind.

I follow the woman down a long, narrow hallway. Every so often there is a door, and I am certain it is our destination, and then we pass it. Another door I won't open, another secret I won't understand. Finally after what seems like hours, the woman pauses in front of a door and swipes a key card. I can hear the door unlock in several different places. I close my eyes and imagine the gears turning, engineering was never my gift, but I can imagine gears turning, that part makes sense to me.

The blonde woman opens the door and smiles as she motions for me to enter. I take slow and careful steps into the room, I am always careful to allow a stranger to close the door behind me. The woman points to a chair, she wants me to sit. The chair is on one side of a desk, and identical chair is on the other, and a water cooler lies silently in the corner of the room. Other than the dirty, bright fluorescent light hanging from the ceiling, these are the only objects that fill the square space. I think that the room should feel stuffy, or damp, or cold, because it is underground, but the temperature is comfortable and the air feels good on my lungs. I take my seat.

"Ms. Everdeen-"

"You can just call me Katniss," I inform her

"Katniss, we are honored that you took the time out of your surely busy schedule to meet us here." The woman says while she takes the seat opposite of me.

"It's no trouble," I mumble.

"None the less, our business here today is very important, and I think it is good if we start our research right away," The woman begins. "Katniss, have you ever heard of a faction?"

I nod my head, "they told me about them when I first arrived here. Dividing people based on personality, it's interesting."

The woman smiles, "yes, I'm glad you think so."

I can't tell yet if I like the woman or not. She seems friendly, though, so does everyone when you first meet them. She has not done anything to harm me, or anyone I know, and she has provided a comfortable chair for me, that should count for something. The importance of comfort is underrated.

"Do you know where we are?" The woman asks me.

"One of the factions, I guess," I tell her.

"Correct. This place used to be a faction called Dauntless. The Dauntless were known as the fearless ones."

"There is no such thing as being fearless," I said, coldly.

"This, Katniss, is something we agree upon. The people of Dauntless taught themselves how to face their fears, to make them less disabling."

That sounds nice, not having a constant stream of worries passing through your brain, learning how to accept your nightmares as just dreams.

"Though the Dauntless do not remain here today, we still have access to their technologies, and with caution, can use them."

When she says this, I slowly begin to understand why I am here.

"You're going to use them on me. You are going to teach me to face my fears," I say.

"You're very clever, Katniss," The woman told me, still smiling. "We understand that you have gone through some very traumatic experiences, and we hope that you understand we are learning to prevent those experiences, that makes us a perfect match."

I wondered how much she knew about my experiences. Does she know about the games and the war and all the death? Maybe she was told exactly that, there was a war, there was death. The end.

"How do you teach people to be fearless?" I asked her.

"Like I said before, we are not trying to make you fearless, we do not believe such a thing is possible," she said patiently.

"Why am I here then?" I asked, trying to equal her calmness.

"Ah, that is what I was getting to. You are here to help us perfect our system of controlling fears. We" she said, gesturing to the room, indicting the life outside of it, "want to help you, and in turn, we hope you can help us. You see, many years ago, the people of this city worked hard to develop a serum; this liquid injects into your blood stream and causes you to see things that you are afraid of, your deepest fears cannot be hidden from the serum."

I shivered at the thought of my deepest fears. Some of them are obvious, anyone who knows about my time in the arenas can tell you them, and then there are some, I'm sure, I don't even know myself.

"How does seeing my deepest fears help me control them?" I questioned.

"That is the point of all this, Katniss, the only way to break free from your fears and gain your mind back, is to defeat them. How to defeat them, no one can tell you, it is something only you can find out," she paused like she was waiting for me to question her again, "would you like to?"

I instantly picture a person, hopelessly fighting their fears for the rest of their lives, never escaping them. I knew what I had to do.

"Yes," I told her. "I am not afraid."

The woman smiled and paused for a moment, looking at me. At first I thought she was sizing me up, but I think she was only trying to understand me. I didn't bother telling her that was pointless.

"Good, you can follow me once more."


End file.
